Editor in Chief: Moh. Reza Huwaida
Friday, August 18th, 2017

Frosty U.S.-Russia Relations about to Get Even Colder

August 06, 2017

WASHINGTON - President Trump came into office hoping to launch a warming in US-Russia relations. Instead, over the last six months, things have gone from cool to icy cold.
If in January Secretary of State Rex Tillerson stated that the United States and Russia “are not likely ever to be friends,” Congress this month approved veto-proof sanctions legislation that baldly labels Russia America’s “adversary.”
Relations, Mr. Trump says, have deteriorated to where they are now “dangerous.”
It’s at this rock-bottom point in relations that Mr. Tillerson will meet with his Russian counterpart, Sergey Lavrov, in Manila this weekend to gauge the prospects of maintaining some level of cooperation in areas of mutual interest. They include Syria, counterterrorism, avoiding a military confrontation in the Baltic Sea, and space.
But even though the two chief diplomats will meet in tropical Manila, heavy coats may be in order to ward off the chill of the deep freeze relations are in – and likely to stay in indefinitely, analysts of US-Russia relations say.(AP)